2014 Primary: Dennis Paul, HD129

The race to replace retiring Rep. John Davis is of particular interest to me because I live in Texas House District 129. I had the opportunity to sit down with Dennis Paul and discuss his candidacy for the district.

Background

Dennis is a local boy through and through. After graduating from South Houston High School in 1979, he attended San Jacinto College, where he founded the college’s first Republican Club. Paul then transferred to the University of Houston, where he received both a BS and MS in Engineering. It was during his graduate studies at UH that he met his future wife, Eliza, who turned down a full ride scholarship to obtain her Phd. from MIT to stay here and marry Dennis. The couple has one daughter.

Professional Life

Dennis is a licensed Engineer, specializing in structural engineering.One of his earliest structural engineering jobs was working on the Disney Concert Hall designed by famed architect Frank Gerhy, who also designed the Lou Ruvo Brain Institute in Las Vegas. After working at a couple of engineering firms, he decided to hang up his own shingle and founded Paul Engineering in 2002. As I was touring his office, I recognized many of the buildings that he has worked on. If you are a resident of HD129, there is a high probability that you have visited one of those buildings.

Political Experience

Much like one of his opponents in this race, it would take a book to list all of Dennis’ activities in the Republican Party. He was in his high school Republican Club, founded the San Jacinto Republican Club, served on the board of the Downtown Houston Pachyderm Club, including a term as President, has been chair of his precinct since he moved to the district, and is currently the SREC committeeman for Senate District 11. He has also served on the Structural Engineers Board for 10 years, serving as the Legislative Liaison. In that role, he has been instrumental in passing several laws, including the Good Samaritan law that prevents volunteer engineers from being sued for their work in emergency situations. The Republican Party of Texas has also used his skills as a legislative liaison to lobby for party platform legislation. Dennis touts the support of the majority of the precinct chairs in HD129, as well as the endorsements of Dr. Steve Hotze and Gary Polland.

Political Philosophy

You can guess his philosophy from the way he describes himself: a proven conservative leader. In our discussion, Dennis constantly used terms like “spending too much”, “cut regulations”, “cut taxes”, “get government out of our lives” – you get the idea. When I asked him what bill he would pass if he was given the opportunity to pass one bill of his choosing, he didn’t hesitate, saying that he would end abortion statewide.

Issues

Paul has no shortage of issues that he wants to focus on.

Economic growth – stimulate the economy by lowering taxes (eliminating the business tax) and cutting regulations.

Process of passing bills – Paul noted that too many times good, conservative legislation gets bottled up in committees. He wants to streamline the process to bypass committees if he has enough support to pass a bill.

Infrastructure – as an engineer, this is especially important to him. We must improve our infrastructure to account for population growth and address our water needs by increasing use of desalination plants.

Local control of schools – we need property tax relief and a stable source of funding. For private schools, the state needs to back off and let them decide the curriculum.